A dental appointment cancelled is an opportunity lost.
A cancelled dental appointment is the loss of an opportunity of healing disease in somebody’s mouth.
Even if the appointment is rescheduled to a later date, that disease and infection will be worse at the later date.
Never better.
There is no benefit for a patient to be cancelling a dental appointment.
It is our duty as health care professionals to do everything possible within our powers to ensure that the patient completes the necessary dental treatment within the time frame that is recommended.
If the patient delays the treatment we have let the patient down by failing to communicate the intended message.
It is our fault that the patient cancels.
They cancel because we have not created in their mind a compelling enough reason for the patient to return.
We have failed to elicit sufficient urgency and concern in the patients’ mind.
This is our fault.
The patient may have left confused or unclear about their next step.
Here’s what needs to happen:
At the completion of each appointment, or at the completion of each phone call to the dental office, the treatment appointed patient must understand the following three things CLEARLY.
If the patient fails to grasp these three things, then there is every likelihood that the patient could cancel their appointment for treatment.
And that is not a good result for the patient.
Because the decay does not disappear on its own. And nor does the periodontal disease disappear for that matter….
The patient must understand exactly what treatment they will be having at their next visit to the Dental Office.
The patient must understand implicitly which teeth are to be treated, what is wrong with them and what that treatment will be.
The patient must understand the recommended time frame or urgency needed for the remaining treatment to be completed.
It is the Dentist’s duty to inform the patient he is seeing when exactly he next wants to that patient to return.
If it is a new patient calling the dental practice, or clerical team taking the incoming call also need to let the patient know of the urgency required to find out EXACTLY what needs to be done next.
The Dentist’s role is to create urgency for the treatment as opposed to creating a *Lack of Urgency* in the Patient’s mind. Creating urgency assists the Front Office team members in securing the next appointment for the Patient.
The patient needs to understand exactly what will happen if the next treatment is not carried out.
The Dentist must inform the patient of the consequences if treatment is not carried out. The patient must understand that taking action is imperative for them. And that delaying action will be harmful to them.
When your patients understand these three clear messages we are telling them then their attendance compliance dramatically increases.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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A post came across my desk last month that I know I need to share with you my readers.
The post was a list of criteria, or conditions that business owners will experience as they journey along the pathway of life.
How you respond as a dental business owner determines your level of success at the completion of your journey.
1. You Will Feel Pain.
“Life wasn’t meant to be easy”
as former Australian Prime minister Malcolm Fraser once said.
And he was correct.
The path to success is littered with failures of people who thought that success comes easily.
It does not.
There are trials and tribulations along the way.
It is how we deal with these speedhumps on the road of life that determines our level of success.
There will always be ups, and downs.
Learn to learn from the downs.
And move on from them quickly.
2. You Will Cry Before You Get It.
Some of the downs will be traumatic.
And gut wrenching.
These are the true tests that are sent to try us.
If you thought the painful things were bad, then just wait for the truly emotional tests.
They will be there.
3. You Will Lose Friends.
This is inevitable.
There are two reasons for you losing friends.
The first is that some of your friends will not like the idea of you being successful. They will do their utmost to discourage your endeavours.
You must move on from these people.
Surround yourself with only those who support you.
The second reason you lose friends is that some of your friends decide that they cannot adjust to the difference in you as you become successful.
Which is odd.
History is littered with long standing friendships between “so called stars” and ordinary folk, that have stood the test of time.
If some of your friends feel that they want to stand aside, it is probably for the best.
Let them make the call.
4. Your family will discourage you.
For all of the reasons mentioned above in point three, you will also have family members who will try to save you from being successful.
They don’t know any better.
Sadly, it is their fear that you will discard them that drives them towards this behaviour.
If they truly trusted their relationship with you, they would know that blood is thicker than water, and that family comes first.
Success does not change those who truly practice family values and support the unity of family.
5. People Will Hate You For No Reason.
Well, possibly it will appear that they will hate you for no reason.
But the main reason this phenomenon does happen is because most people are fearful of change, and of power.
And your new success comes with a lot of change, and also comes with some acquired authority to you.
And that will threaten some people.
Just move on from these people.
Sadly it is the change they see happening to you that threatens them.
6. You Will Almost Talk Yourself Out Of It a Hundred Times.
Self-doubt is common.It is the true achievers who power through the incidences of self-doubt who achieve the true successes they deserve.
Learning to manage any negative self-talk is an important selective criterion that determines true success.
Success comes to those who plan for success.
Part of that planning is knowing when to dismiss the negative self-talk.
Thank you for indulging me in these first six inevitable criteria of success. I’ll cover the final five criteria for achieving that success in next Friday’s blog post.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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Last week we discussed some of the topics that should never be spoken about in the dental office.
Today I’m going to talk about the four topics that will always get the patient opening up and owning the discussions.
These topics are so easy to bring up conversationally and are also very easy to allow you to “prompt” the patient to really “go to town” and divulge a whole lot of information.
Remember that whenever we have the patient talking about themselves, they are talking about their favourite subject.
And while they are doing that, and you are listening to them, they will believe that YOU are the most interesting person they have spoken to all week.
Try these out on your next patient and watch how easily they start motoring along about themselves.
FAMILY
People love to talk about their family.
“Do you have any children?”
“Do they live nearby?”
“DO you have any grandchildren?”
“What do they do?”
It is so easy to simply ask gentle questions that get people talking about their families and what they do.
Everybody is full of stories about relatives they are proud of…it’s simply a matter of enticing those great stories out
OCCUPATION
Someone comes in in business attire:
“Do you work nearby?”
“What do you do for a living?”
“Have you been there long?”
“Have you always been in that industry?”
“How many people work there?”
You’ll be surprised how easily your patients will “open up” to discuss their work place and what they do at work.
RECREATION
Everybody has a hobby, be it a sport, reading, watching TV, and collecting.
And most people are passionate about these things they do in their spare time.
It’s not difficult to find out what interests your patients like to pursue.
“What have you got planned for the weekend?”
“How’s your month looking?”
“Seen any good movies lately?”
Again, avoid passing judgement by asking questions rather than offering up statements.
“What did you think of it?”
is better than
“Oh I saw that. It was terrible!”
Remember, the more we allow our patients to open up about themselves, the more we are able to make note of things that we can share with them at a later date.
DREAMS and DESIRES.
“What have you got planned for Christmas?”
“Are you going away?”
“Do you have any holidays planned?”
“Anywhere in the world that you’d like to go?”
“Have you ever been on a cruise?”
Everybody has secret desires and aspirations and wishes. Lists of things they’d like to do someday.
All you need to do is ask.
You can always coax more information out of your patients by asking gentle probing questions:
“Tell me more…”
“That sounds like fun…”
“Wow!!”
It is not difficult, in fact it is very easy to get people talking about their favourite subject.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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“Entrepreneurs are willing to work an 80 hour work to avoid a 40 hour week”
Sometimes the rest of the world needs to know this.
After all, as a dental practice business owner, when do you really switch off?
After working four or five days a week drilling teeth, or more, you then have to turn around and find time to “run” the business, don’t you?
You know…. you’re expected to do the HR, supervise the payroll, oversee and sometimes invent the marketing, do the business planning, pay the bills, organise the insurances….the list goes on…
And who has the time then for being a dentist?
It would seem that many in society, including some dentists themselves, don’t appreciate the long hours put in by dental practice owners in running a dental practice, on top of all the time spent drilling teeth.
Why would you not want to be remunerated for all of those extra hours of business administration?
Sadly, a lot of dentists discount this time.
Recently in a discussion with employees of a well-known dental association, the time required for this sort of business administration was “brushed aside” by one of the association employees as:
“something the dentist can do on the weekend”
To which I asked:
“Why?”
Because if the dentist did not do it, these duties would be performed by hired help who would and should be remunerated for doing so…. so why not remunerate the dentist?
Interestingly, a lot of corporate roll-up buy-outs engage the selling dentist to continue the administration, without ever remunerating the selling dentist for these ongoing administrations that the business, and the purchaser, still requires.
Sadly, some people within the dental industry brush over the importance of these behind the scenes services provided by the owners that are indeed an integral part of the ongoing success of the dental practice.
The value of these services performed by the owning dentist are continually downplayed by staff, dentists, and also by customers of the business.
A great dental practice just does not happen by accident.
The behind the scenes work done by the owners is often the bricks and mortar foundation that the business of the practice is built upon….and is too often taken for granted.
Success doesn’t happen by magic.
It is the result of particular preparation, planning, and hard work.
The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.
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